The Spring SFFS/KRF Grant
winners have been announced! SFFS, in partnership with the Kenneth
Rainin Foundation, is giving away serious money once again, continuing
the rapid growth as a prolific funding source in indie cinema—past
winners include Beasts of the Southern Wild and Fruitvale Station!

​
Eight filmmaking teams were granted funding a total of $340,000 in
funding—the largest amount disbursed to date—to help with their next
stage of production, from screenwriting to post. Congratulations to the
following filmmakers! We look forward to viewing their work!Read More

The San Francisco Film Society spent an afternoon with Lance Edmands and
Kyle Martin, director and producer of Bluebird - the latest in a long
line of FABULOUS films supported by the SFFS/KRF Filmmaking Grant -
before they left for their world premiere at Tribeca Film Festival this
week! See sffs.org/filmmaker360 for more details.

Spring 2013 SFFS/KRF Filmmaking Grant Winners will be announced tomorrow!

We caught up with Destin Daniel Cretton, who is riding high from his recent sweep at SXSW -- his world premiere of Short Term 12 won both 2013 Grand Jury Award and the Audience Award for Narrative Feature competition! Short Term 12 was a 2012 SFFS/KRF Filmmaking Grant winner for postproduction. The video features an insightful interview with Destin about his filmmaking background and creative process, and includes behind-the-scenes footage from the film!

A film by Patrick Trefz for the San Francisco Film Society
Edited by Rosendo Ayala

SFFS/KRF Filmmaking Grant winner Aurora Guerrero talks her new script, Los Valientes, over at SFGate today. By the way, our new SFFS/KRF Grant round just opened up! A chunk of the $300,000 could be yours...

We're are getting so antsy to see the premieres of these five films that the San Francisco Film Society has supported through Filmmaker360
grants and fiscal sponsorship at Sundance 2013's U.S. and World Cinema Dramatic and Documentary Competitions! For those who will be making the snowy trek and for those of us who won't, watch interviews and previews below.

CUTIE AND THE BOXER

This
candid New York love story explores the chaotic 40-year marriage of
famed boxing painter Ushio Shinohara and his wife, Noriko. Anxious to
shed her role as her overbearing husband's assistant, Noriko finds an
identity of her own.

INEQUALITY FOR ALL

In
this timely and entertaining documentary, noted economic-policy expert
Robert Reich distills the topic of widening income inequality, and
addresses the question of what effects this increasing gap has on our
economy and our democracy.

NARCO CULTURA

An
examination of Mexican drug cartels’ influence in pop culture on both
sides of the border as experienced by an LA narcocorrido singer dreaming
of stardom and a Juarez crime scene investigator on the front line of
Mexico’s Drug War.

By now, you've probably heard—the official selections are in
for Sundance 2013's U.S. and World Cinema Dramatic and Documentary
Competitions. Among them are five films that the Film Society has
supported through grants and fiscal sponsorships as they've developed
into feature-length, fully-formed films:

by
Michele Turnure-Salleo, Director, Filmmaker360

It's clear when you meet Ryan Coogler that he is something special.

I met Ryan in January 2012 at Sundance Film Festival. Soon after the festival, we
met again back in San Francisco and began talking about living in the Bay Area,
filmmaking and his film, Fruitvale, which
follows the true storyof Oscar Grant, who was
killed in a police shooting in Oakland on New Year’s Eve 2008.

He
shared his script with me and it was clear that he was a natural fit for our
recently launched Off the Page
program, where we bring actors to the Bay Area to workshop scripts with
writer/directors involved with us in various ways. Ryan had actors Melonie Diaz
and Michael B. Jordan attached and it looked likely that they were going to
start shooting in July. We thought it would be an incredible experience for
them all to get to know one another in the Bay Area where the film would be
shot, and to meet Oscar Grant’s family prior to beginning production.

Ryan
was already a finalist for the SFFS/Kenneth
Rainin Foundation Filmmaking Grant, but it was during the months leading up
to and during Off the Page that we
really got to know him, his producing team (Nina Yang, Sev Ohanian and Gerard McMurray) and his project.
He had recently graduated from USC and had returned to the Bay Area determined
to make films here. We introduced him to Bay Area crew and then in late spring
2012 awarded him a $100,000 SFFS/KRF grant for production. The grant review panel
was incredibly moved by this very timely and poignant story of Oscar Grant, and
its exploration of the contemporary issue of the police shooting and killing of
young unarmed African American men. And while we are committed to working with filmmakers from all over
the country, finding someone local who so perfectly fit our mandate to support
filmmakers and films that uplift the Bay Area professionally and economically .
. . was like hitting the jackpot.

But
to be honest, a big reason the film was funded is because we were so taken by
Ryan as an individual. He
is talented, passionate, creative, collaborative and yet very humble . . . Every
interaction with Ryan has been a pleasure. He is the heart and soul of his film
and that really came out in the way we’ve worked together this past year. Hard to believe it’s only been a year.

I
wonder who I’ll meet next year . . .

Ryan
Coogler is currently a finalist for the Fall 2012 SFFS/Kenneth Rainin
Foundation Filmmaking Grant. Winners will be announced in early December.

‘Beasts of the Southern Wild’ explores the fertile and terrifying world of a child’s imagination. Its fertility and its terror stem from the same truth: To the young mind, there is no sealed barrier cleaving reality from fantasy … The film is its own beast, and it’s a rare one.

SF Film Society Blog

We announce the full program of the 58th San Francisco International Film Festival tomorrow morning! So many exciting films, programs & special events to share with you all. Something for everyone this Fest! Parents, look out for our Short 5: Family Films program. This annual collection of shorts — one of the most popular programs at #SFIFF — is sure to please the smallest members of your family as well as the young at heart and everyone in between. A variety of incredible storytellers & animators have attended this program in years past, including #MoonbotStudios, #JonKlassen, #BillPlympton, #MoWillems, #AardmanAnimations,#WestonWoods and some of the current greats at #Pixar. After films screen, we host Q&As and meet-and-greets, where you’ll have the opportunity to chat with filmmaker guests, and maybe even catch an autograph or two. Pictured below is #RobertKondo — a director of the Academy Award-nominated film #TheDamKeeper — signing the shoe of a fan at this program at SFIFF57. Stay tuned: this year’s (knockout) lineup will be released tomorrow with the rest of the Fest!

We are stoked to present NightLife @calacademy on April 2! Evening highlights include a special screening of Oscar nom'd short #TheDamKeeper with a live drawing demo from one of the film's directors; a Q&A with the minds behind Google Advanced Technology Projects and Spotlight Stories; and an exclusive clips presentation from #Advantageous, a sci-fi #Sundance prize-winner from Bay Area filmmaker Jennifer Phang, who will stick around to talk special effects after the screening. & If you feel the need to shake loose at any point, dip out into Cal Academy's gorgeous piazza and get down at our Silent Disco, featuring synthy and riffy jams from some of your favorite 70s & 80s film soundtracks. Visit bit.ly/SFIFFlife for tickets & more! Photo by Lizzy Brooks.

We are excited to announce the Opening, Centerpiece and Closing films at the 58th San Francisco International Film Festival! This year, #AlexGibney's intelligent and insightful doc #SteveJobs: The Man in the Machine will kick off the program; #TheEndOfTheTour, a biographical drama following literary giant #DavidFosterWallace, will play as #SFIFF's Centerpiece film; and #Experimenter, in which #PeterSarsgaard gives a stellar performance as controversial social scientist Stanley Milgram will close out the Fest. Tickets to all three films are on sale to #SFFSmembers now, public onsale begins noon Friday (3/27). Full info at sffs.org.

#TBT: About 20 years ago, soon-to-be sci-fi & fantasy legend #GuillermoDelToro attended the San Francisco International Festival will his very first feature film, #Cronos, a vampire horror set in 16th century Mexico. He has done much work since SFIFF37, becoming a major player in both commercial and indie camps, with films ranging from the magical #PansLabyrinth to the spectacular #PacificRim. We are so pleased to announce that del Toro will be the recipient of this year's Irving M. Levin Directing Award. Catch him at the #CastroTheatre on April 25 to hear him discuss his career, to see clips from both old and new work and to watch one of his best-loved films, #TheDevilsBackbone. Tickets on sale to #SFFSmembers now, public onsale begins noon March 21. Full info at sffs.org.

#Regram from @ross_bros. Stoked that these guys won the Louis Black “Lone Star” Award at #SXSW for their film #Western. Congrats to the filmmakers and crew behind this stunning production. Proud that this doc is one that #SFFSsupports!

Don't call him Ricky — at least, not if you expect him to answer. The recipient of this year's Peter J. Owens Award is none other than screen legend #RichardGere. We are so excited to honor this prolific actor with one of the Festival's most prestigious prizes. Gere will host an evening at the #CastroTheatre, where he will discuss his career and screen his new film #TimeOutOfMind, a stunning, observational portrait of a man who must cope with homelessness in contemporary New York. Tickets on sale to #SFFSmembers now. Public onsale begins noon March 19. Visit sffs.org to purchase or for full details.

Each year at the Festival, we honor an actor whose career exemplifies independence & integrity with #SFIFF's Peter J. Owens Award. Recipients of this esteemed prize include screen legends #DustinHoffman, #HarrisonFord and #WinonaRyder (pictured). When Ryder was recognized back in 2000, we screened #TheAgeOfInnocence, a film for which she earned an Academy Award under Martin Scorsese's direction. We will be announcing this year's awardee early next week. Until then, enjoy this #TBT!

Don't walk, RUN: earlybird #SFIFF ticket packages are now on sale, and we just announced this year's slate of feature-length competition films! Golden Gate Award nominees this Fest hail from almost 20 countries across the globe and are in contention for nearly $40k in prizes. Get to know these remarkable films before we release the rest of the Fest and snag discounted tickets at sffs.org. Pictured: Run, a narrative film from the Ivory Coast & France up for the New Directors Prize at SFIFF58.

Missed it last #SFIFF? We've collected as many streaming links as we could dig up for films from last year's Festival. Start a SFIFF57 movie marathon while you wait for us to release the full SFIFF58 lineup on March 31. You've got 21 days and more than 40 films to choose from (including the gorgeously filmed #Tracks, starring #MiaWasikowska, pictured). Make your way to blog.sffs.org/watch – a simpler trek than one across the Australian Outback.

Thrilled to announce that #MirandaJuly will be bringing #NewSociety, her latest performance project, to #SFIFF audiences April 28 & 29. Hilarious and moving, this experiment in theatrical collaboration chronicles the ways societies emerge, transform, decay and persist over time. Like July's other projects, New Society blurs boundaries between fiction and reality, and audience and performer. So excited to present this event in collaboration with #SFMOMA; tickets on sale NOW to our members & theirs at sffs.org. Photo by #PamelaGentile. #SFFSmembers

In anticipation of this Friday's release of Boyhood with the filmmaker returning to SF for a round of Q&As, watch the onstage interview with Richard Linklater and Parker Posey and Boyhood Q&A from An Evening with Richard Linklater at the 57th San Francisco International Film Festival!

The San Francisco Film Society wrapped its 57th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 24–May 8) with 263 screenings of 168 films from 56 countries, which were attended by over 300 filmmakers and industry guests from over 20 countries. Over 15 days, SFIFF57 showed 74 narrative features, 29 documentary features and a total of 65 short films. See all the highlights and photo galleries!

Last night, the 57th San Francisco International Film Festival announced the winners of the juried Golden Gate Award and New Directors Prize competitionsat an event held at Rouge | Nick’s Crispy Tacos. This year the Festival awarded nearly $40,000 in prizes to emerging and established filmmakers from 13 countries around the globe!